Giving Back to the Field
By Melissa Chambers, Associate Director of Institutional Relations
Like most international education offices, you’ll find within our walls many individuals whose lives were transformed through an experience studying, interning, or living abroad. Many Arcadians choose to give back to the field that gave so much to them by engaging with a myriad of professional organizations. In The College of Global Studies, we have advisory board and regional representatives of the Rainbow SIG of NAFSA (Melissa Chambers, Drew Villerme-Lightfoot); and staff who hold current or recent leadership roles in the Pennsylvania Council for International Education (Chris Good), The Forum on Education Abroad (Wendy Lombardo, Adam Rubin, Lorna Stern, John Wells), the Association of Study Abroad Providers in Ireland (Tom Kelley), the Global Leadership League (Lisa Donatelli), and PULSE, a network of full-time international health and safety professionals working in higher education (Maureen Gordon)--to name just a few.
Over the years our staff has also been engaged with Lessons From Abroad (LFA), Diversity Abroad, Overseas Security and Advisory Council (OSAC) of the Department of State, and presented at state, regional, and national conferences. Our staff regularly serve as Consular Affairs Liaison for the Education Abroad Knowledge Community of NAFSA, most recently program managers Shannon Peak Bernardo and Mary Rogers. Shannon commented, “Serving as a CAL is challenging, but also quite rewarding…not only do we get to help students (legally) get to their respective destinations, we also get to interact with other professionals in the field within our CAL teams…it is a great opportunity to get involved….”.
How do you give back to the field? What other organizations do you recommend we connect with and fuel our passion for education abroad?
(pictured above)- Wendy Lombardo, Associate Director for Institutional Relations, presenting at the Accelerated Residency Program – Professional Certification in Education Abroad as a Forum Trained Facilitator in summer 2018